Datacenter Storage Architecture for MapReduce Applications

Data-intensive computing systems running MapReducestyle applications are currently architected with storage local to computation in the same physical box. This poster argues that upcoming advances in converged datacenter networks will allow MapReduce applications to utilize and benefit from network-attached storage. This is made possible by properties of all MapReduce-style applications, such as streaming storage access patterns. By decoupling computation and storage, stateless compute nodes containing inexpensive, low-power processors can be deployed in large numbers to increase application performance, improve reliability, and decrease power consumption.